Why now is the time to #DivestTMT #MaunaKea and how moving a proposed Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) from Mauna Kea, Hawaiʻi to Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (ORM) in La Palma, Canary Islands sets the Best Course for the next decade of 21st century scientific inquiry.
Short link 🔗 https://j.mp/DivestTMT
Best: 1) excelling all others; 2) most productive of good; offering or producing the greatest advantage, utility, or satisfaction (Merriam-Webster).
For knowledgeable people on the matter, and learners of good faith, simply reading the dictionary definition of the word best, is likely sufficient to persuade that Mauna Kea is far from the best location for thirty meter telescope technology.
Even skeptics and others are persuaded of the fact – when acquainted with the facts of known, comprehensive, third-party risk assessments dating as far back as 2007 – by an overwhelming preponderance of evidence, that Mauna Kea has for decades been known to be problematic as a site for telescopes, in general. Upon modestly closer inspection, the vast majority of intellectually honest investigators soon find that not only is Mauna Kea not the best location for a TMT, Mauna Kea may be among the worst possible sites for a TMT.
Worst: 1) most corrupt, bad, evil, or ill; 2a) most unfavorable, difficult, unpleasant, or painful; 2b) most unsuitable, faulty, unattractive, or ill-conceived; 2c: least skillful or efficient (Merriam-Webster).
For those less knowledgeable about this issue, or those confused about how TMT seemingly “suddenly became a thing,” we are talking about a decades-old debacle over the atttempt to site a TMT atop sacred Mauna Kea (aka Mauna a Wakea, see the 2006 documentary Temple Under Seige).
Beginning with that film, viewers and motivated learners will soon discover – there are so many layers of disinformation, misinformation, bad faith negotiation, broken agreements, contracts, and just plain old ignorance, greed and animosity toward the environment; toward traditional and indigenous peoples and culture; and toward the gentile, accommodating, goodwill nature of Hawaiians known as aloha – that it is very very difficult to begin to even consider where to start in terms of explaining how and why this sacred Hawaiian location for an eighteen-story high telescope is not only not the best location, but arguably, the very worst possible location for a TMT.
Moreover, despite many promising, if-long-overdue advances for the scientific conscience in recent years; the recalcitrant, colonizing, corporate, academic, and media mantra that Mauna Kea is the “best possible location for astronomy” has become, essentially, a kind of cultish wishful chant unto itself. Heedless planners and developers, beset by conflicts of interest on all sides, forcefully advocate for the continued desecration of Mauna Kea; at times even ragefully advancing this neo-rational rant as grounds for their entitlement to dynamite, dig, gouge, and build eighteen stories on conservation-zoned land. It is a rant that stands in almost perfect cognitive diametric opposition to empirical conditions as they actually exist here, in the real, objective, material world of lava, sea, and snow; atop Earths’s highest peak, as measured from the seafloor.
By endlessly repeating the phrase, “Mauna Kea is the best possible location for astronomy,” many TMT zero-sum zealots and big business interests have effectively coerced many of their indentured academic astronomy departments – those who desperately depend upon patron funding for survival – into what amounts to “superstitious chanting” in hopes of willing TMT into existence in a place that – by all objective observations, according to first-person interviews and third-party risk assessments – it clearly doesn’t belong. In this way, scientists and funders themselves are engaging in the very practice of which they all too often disdainfully accuse indigenous peoples and practitioners. It’s a bit like a very bizarre case of collective, institutional, cultural, narcissistic projection and gaslighting. Weird, to say the least, considering the fact that the vast majority of Hawaiians, and millions worldwide, have made it more than clear that they don’t want TMT in Hawaiʻi, and certainly not atop the sacred peaks of Mauna a Wakea.
For more than a decade, the documented fact of the matter is: “Sentiments against further telescope development are strong,” as established in the third-party report titled, Assessment of the Risks for Siting the Thirty Meter Telescope on Mauna Kea (Keystone Center, 26 Oct. 2007. Credit: Maile¹.)
Below is just one revealing and overwhelmingly incriminating screenshot from this report. Feel free to access the full report yourself, to review additional findings and reach your own conclusions.
Notwithstanding, the phrase “sentiments are strong” in describing Hawaiian opposition to TMT for at least the past thirteen years, may be one of the greatest understatements I have ever encountered. For context, I’ve definitely encountered some impressively absurd claims over more than a quarter century as a computer network engineer, technology and policy architect, researcher, entrepreneur, startup-advisor, and business consultant. Still, the astronomical miscalculation of underestimating and understating the scale and scope of decades-long persisent opposition to TMT atop Mauna Kea may be hard to beat in this lifetime.
So, given all this overwhelming opposition to TMT on Mauna Kea from its very inception, by what possible legitimate criteria can the claim that “Mauna Kea is best for TMT” continue to be argued or advanced? The short answer is: it simply can’t.
Nevertheless, for the benefit of all, let us return to and carefully re-read the definition of best. Then, for those so inclined – especially those special readers most inclined toward the trolling technique known as sea-lioning – we can for the umpteenth time consider, reconsider and ruminate upon the question of how do we define best; particularly when it comes to building eighteen story tall telescopes upon the world’s highest mountain peak, on land that is zoned for conservation, and held sacred by generations of local and indigenous people.
So what’s best? In scientific fields, the hard, cold facts of mathematics are generally submitted as the most important criteria by which to define the correct, or best solutions. Other concerns are often treated as secondary or lesser distractions, annoyances, or confrontational “gauntlets,” as the Keystone Center dubbed them. Gauntlets to be vanquished by sheer intellectual firepower, bullying, trolling, economic force, or by state-sponsored violence, as a last resort. From every colonizer’s perspective, this much is certain: the colonizing force will get its way, come hell or high water, in the name of science, math, jobs, profit, or whatever other impetuous and destructive diety the invading militarized force worships at the moment.
For far too long, military-industrialized science-as-usual as operated in this manner, demolishing everything in its path with a conquistador’s religious zeal. This fact, for anyone who has found themselves trampled by this kind of development, might just top the earlier understatement as the biggest understatement in history. Are we picking up on a theme here, yet?
For at least the past thirteen years, all of TMT partners have known that, “As a rule, The Keystone Center urges groups like TMT not to ask for advice if they are not prepared to first hear it and to then reciprocally enter into principled negotiations that respond to the requested advice when it involves criticisms and concerns.”
It is now incontestable that the siting of TMT on Mauna Kea is yet another in a long line of militarized scientific- academic decisions that has merely paid lip service to the practice of “principled negotiation.” The veracity of this realization is fully revealed by the fact that financiers ultimately resort to state-sponsored violence time and time again; all in the reverent name of scientific inquiry. Needless to say, this is not the best course for scientific inquiry, moving forward into the 2020’s, let alone into the twenty-second century, which children born today will easily live to see; if we survive as a species, that is.
In practical application, the western jihad of militarized science and academic research isn’t much different from that of Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors. Conquistadors carried a message that claimed to uplift humanity, to increase peace and cultivate freedom, all through the methods of colonization, subjugation, and violence. Like conquistadors of yore, today’s scientists often go out of their way to convert unbelievers by way of lyrical cosmic poetry and mesmerizing neurolinguistic gymnastics. But in the end, the message of both conquering cleric and military-industrial funded academic is all too often the same: “believe in our religion of Almighty Science, or be exterminated.”
All of this is why the final bastion and safe-place of choice for the most strident and hardcore colonizer-scientists is oftentimes math. TMT is no exception. The math of investments made. The math of adoptive optics. The make-believe math of partner pledges, that aren’t even close to contractural obligations to provide funding. Any of these, or other spontaneously conjured creative calculations can be trotted out as incontrovertible justifications for why the project must not be stopped, at any and all cost, including deploying state violence to enforce the deific preeminence of sponsors corporate budgets, speculative spreadsheets, and financial model projections.
Math is important. We’re not negating its foundational status in accurately describing and predicting the way that the material world appear to us. Nothing that we’ve written refutes the fact that the emotionless calculations of mathematics are by far the best way to measure the effectiveness of car safety, the amount of effective dosage in medications, and the durability of bungee jumping cords. Math is fundamental to human civilization, to our present living conditions, and to our future way of life.
However, when locations are selected for extremely large scale construction in the name of scientific inquiry, math alone is not enough. It is not enough to appeal to the alluring elegance of adaptive optical mathematics as sufficient to entitle investigaors and developers to build whatever we want, wherever we want.
There seems to be a perception held by many mathematically adept humans that others simply don’t understand our inherently superior mathematical insights, which, in many cases, seem to instantly transmute into imperatives. We have heard the argument time and time again, that “those people” would agree with us if only “they” understood the math; implying that if “they” were as intelligent as we are, as logical and analytical as we are, “they” would “do the right thing” and agree with us.
This kind of thinking has justified some of the worst human atrocities in history. It is a strain of intellectual superiority that is all too often deeply entangled with racial superiority; but it also can be, and all too often is excercised by any ethnic group.
In the western scientific-colonial context, this dangerous strand of cognitive supremacy all too often aids and abets white supremacy in the expression of scientific infrastructure construction and related public policy. This, however, is an extremely complicated topic for another time. For our purpose, it is enough to acknowledge that these and other “collectively unconscious” cognitive biases of Western settler colonialism are almost always at work behind the scenes, even in the process – or maybe especially in the process – of making so-called strictly objective, scientific decisions.
Which brings us, at last, a bit closer to approaching the original question, now equipped with some additional useful resources to make the attempt at responding: what, exactly, does best mean, when mathematics is not the sole determining factor for any given scientific or public policy decision? What does best mean in the real world context of 21st century Science, Technology, and Society (STS)?
How do we ultimately decide what is best? Who decides? Why? These are the kinds of questions that the interdisciplinary academic field of STS is uniquely qualified to address.
Deploying an STS framework can help the TMT consortium to finally understand why divesting from TMT on Mauna Kea is, indeed, the best decision to make as a first priority of the new year and new decade that begins on January 1, 2020.
As described by MIT Open Courseware, “Science and technology are no longer specialized enterprises confined to factories and laboratories: they have become intertwined with each other and with human society. The fundamental contribution of STS is to look at the human-built world as an integrated whole.”
At Stanford University, “STS students … take two types of courses: (a) technical courses in which they learn and practice science or engineering, and (b) courses in which they study the social and historical context of science and technology. These latter courses engage students with critical aspects of how science and technology are communicated, governed, and taught, as well as how science and technology affect communication, governance, and education.” We would add to this, how science and technology affect communities and environments; from the most fundamental aspects of society, to the most sublime and intricate aspects of the often “unseen” infrastructure that sets the stage – defines the opportunties and limitations – for human interaction and activity.
Given the current rate of acceleration of what author Kevin Kelly dubbed the technium – in short, the entirety of human technological expression – including but not limited to the commercialization of space, the expansion of artificial intelligence and machine learning, the prevalence of data privacy (or lack thereof), and real world questions we face here, now: complex decisions about where to site eighteen story telescopes and seventy-five story high windmills. In these and similar cases, STS might arguably be one of the most important academic disciplines of the 21st century. There is no question that we will benefit, as individuals, and as a society by bringing this mature, integrated, interdisciplinary academic rigor into every public policy decisions facing us, day in and day out.
In practical terms, imagine that scientists decided that Mount Everest or Mount Sinai were ideal for a particular kind of telescope. Would people be excited about a handful of jobs that such a project promises? Jobs that very likely could be automated out of existence within a year or two? Would scientists claim that an eighteen story telescope would elevate the status and stature of Mount Sinai? These and other social, environmental, and ethical questions are at least equally valid to optimizing the observation of billions of years old extinguished light. STS brings all these elements into the decision making process, with proportional salience and status.
It is easy to imagine the global public outcry if Mount Everest or Mount Sinai, or any similarly sacred site, were suddenly bulldozed to make room for an eighteen story structure of any kind. Can jobs and construction contracts possibly elevate the status of any of those most sacred peaks? We’re confident that every intellectually honest reader can only answer: absolutely not.
Yet, somehow, our mainstream, military-industrialized corporate media depicts the sacredness of Mauna Kea as some kind of naive or ignorant superstition. This media machine makes the argument that a handful of dubious jobs, or lucrative concrete, steel, glass, and asphalt contracts will somehow elevate the naturally sacred status of Mauna Kea as the world’s most majestic summit, rising 10,203 meters (34,476 feet) from the seafloor; nearly three miles higher than Mount Everest’s elevation above sea level.
In spite of the indisputable math marking Mauna Kea’s unique geographical status, some scientists and enthusiasts continue to grouse that an appeal to sacredness somehow illegitimately hijacks the conversation, robbing the discussion space of all reason, logic, and good-faith negotiation. What is ironic in this complaint is its own blind absolutism; its own illegitimate negation of the direct lived experience of others. By declaring that sacredness is an unfair criteria, the implication is that science or some other value system is even more sacred. Without using the word itself, this complaint frames science as more sacred than the sanctity of Mauna Kea.
Sacred: 1a) dedicated or set apart for the service or worship of a deity; 1b) devoted exclusively to one service or use; 2a) worthy of religious veneration; 2b) entitled to reverence and respect;
3) of or relating to religion; 4) archaic; 5a) unassailable, inviolable; 5b) highly valued and important.
The definition of sacredness is not exclusively religious, it is not some kind of irrational woo-woo, or somehow unfair in the context of public policy discussion and decision making. To be devoted to a particular purpose, to be entitled to respect, to be highly valued and important, is to be sacred. Science itself is effectively considered sacred, sacrosanct, to many, even if those words are carefully avoided. Contrary to some TMT advocate complaints, sacredness has to do with the most refined and relevent expressions of social and institutional legitimacy, cultural and shared value, and public significance. As we’ve written before, science often acts very much like a religion unto itself. It’s not an insult to science to make clear that virtually anything that is universally unique and revered can be considered sacred. There is nothing irrational or woo-woo in the word itself, much less the principle of sacredness itself.
Mauna Kea certainly stands alone as the highest point on planet Earth. Mauna Kea is clearly, “highly valued and important,” not just to indigenous Hawaiians, but it is “universally unique and revered” by millions who have visited, long before the thousands who have since come from all over the world to demonstrate their solidarity with the 38 kūpuna (elders) who have been protecting Mauna Kea since July 12, 2019. Add to these the thousands of Hawaiians who have long stood in protection of Mauna Kea for 10, 20 years, or longer. Yet, many media outlets fail to mention anything even remotely representative of the decades of widespread opposition to any kind of development whatsoever, on Mauna Kea. The most strident astronomers and financiers make it all about themselves and their coveted telescope, but it wouldn’t matter what kind of eighteen story structure was proposed to be constructed on conservation-zoned land atop this sacred peak; Hawaiians and all people of conscience would vehemently oppose its construction.
Which brings us back to that 2007 report:
“As a rule, The Keystone Center urges groups like TMT not to ask for advice if they are not prepared to first hear it and to then reciprocally enter into principled negotiations that respond to the requested advice when it involves criticisms and concerns.
For far too long, scientists and developers in general have dismissed, ignored, or been ignorant to the fragile sacredness of our planet, as whole. Sacredness is not, as antagonists complain, some kind of cop-out from grown up conversation. On the contrary, sacredness matures our conversation in a way that is vital to our survival as a species into the next century. The climate change catastrophe that we face today epitomizes the results of rigid, colonial, 20th century scientific thinking and behavior. We cannot, as a species, afford to capitulate to the tantrums of fragile, pathologically narcissistic norms of practicing science, conducting research, or industrial development.
Moving forward, if we are to make the best choices in terms of guiding the long term trajectory of science, technology, and society, we must incorporate the empirical sacredness of this “pale blue dot,” as Carl Sagan referred to our extraordinarily unique and sacred island Earth.
Moving the thirty meter telescope from Mauna Kea to La Palma enacts a clear commitment to setting that best course — the most productive of good; offering and producing the greatest advantage, utility, and satisfaction — not just for astronomy, not just for this new decade, but for the trajectory of 21st century scientific inquiry into the next century.
Why is this decision so significant? Because the whole world is watching this debate at the top of the world for some indication of whether or not we continue with business as usual, or begin to learn from our mistakes and make better choices for ourselves, and our world.
NOW TAKE ACTION
Share this article with short link …
🔗 https://j.mp/DivestTMT
… to all TMT Partners at
https://www.tmt.org/page/partners
… and on Twitter, Facebook, etc.
@MooreFound @Caltech @IndiaDST @NRC_CNRC @CNRC_NRC @AuraDC @UCPress @UCObservatories @uc_faculty @ucberkely @ucb_astronomy @ucdavis @UofTastro @prcnaoj_en @GovHawaii @DLNR @UHawaiiNews
@KAHEAalliance @TMTLaPalma
Additional Reading
- “Top 3 reasons why TMT Mauna Kea proponents would be wise to reconsider”
- "Doling out #Colonialism: Refiguring Archival Memory of Settler Colonialism in the Hawaiian Islands" (Hummel-Colla, Christina Lehua. UCLA Journal of Education and Information Studies. 2019. Peer reviewed).
- “Decolonization is not a Metaphor” (Tuck, Eve, and Wang, K Wayne, Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, Vol 1 No 1 (2012).
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- Credit for surfacing this important historical resource belongs to Dr. David Uahikeaikaleiʻohu Maile. Dr. Maile is a “Kanaka Maoli scholar, activist, and practitioner from Maunawili, Oʻahu. He is an Assistant Professor of Indigenous Politics in the Department of Political Science and Affiliate Faculty in the Centre for Indigenous Studies at the University of Toronto” (uakhikea.com). Mahalo, Professor Maile!
